How different would have been the achievement of indian independence without mahatma gandhi ? discuss?
Answers
He became the leader of congress and thus the independence movement after the death of Lokmanya Tilak in 1920. Let's assume for a moment Gandhi never existed or even though he did, he never come up with the philosophy of nonviolence and truth or he stayed in South Africa forever never coming back into British India. What then? Would the congress be left without any leader? Would the independence movement be without any vision or philosophy to follow?
NO!! There were many great leaders among the congress. Someone of them would have given the vision and philosophy and leadership needed. Someone would have taken the responsibilities. It might have been one individual or a group of individual. And he/they would have succeeded in achieving the independence sooner or later than 1947. Or may be even the armed revolutionary movement would have become prominent and India would have got independence after a great armed rebellion. It is quite a huge event containing so many factors to speculate precisely.
But your question assumes that post independence events and progress would have been the same in absence of Mahatma Gandhi's role in independence movement which is not quite true!!!
Take a look at the movements all over world, French revolution, Russian revolution or recent revolutions in middle east etc. The governments that came in power after these revolutions didn't last for very long time. The people were not satisfied with them and sooner or later those governments collapsed giving rise to another revolution or new system of governance or anarchy.
Although these revolutions were against the established systems, evidently the governments that came in power after the revolutions were not accepted by people either. Majority didn't approve them or they didn't work as per the expectations of the people.
This didn't happen in India because the innovative ways of Gandhiji. The path chosen by him included a vast majority of people of India in to the freedom struggle. You didn't need guns and bombs to fight anymore. You need not be a large group of people headed by a good leader and backed by newspapers to protest and seek justice. Simple acts by individuals such as refusing to use foreign goods, refusing to pay taxes, lifting a feastfull of salt, quitting government schools and jobs became the weapons of freedom struggle. This gave a feeling of integrity among the people. They embraced the struggle as their own. And thus the constitution that evolved through this struggle was accepted by all and gave 70 years of peace and progress to the country.
I don't know if it would have been simple or difficult to achieve the independence in absence of Mahatma Gandhi. But I'm quite sure it would have been very difficult, almost impossible to keep it.
There is no doubt that India would have achieved Independence without Gandhiji but the role of Gandhi was very significant in achieving as well as preserving the Independence of India.
I think without Gandhi, there would not have such mass mobilization in such a short span of time. All the classes of the people would not have united under one banner or leader.The freedom movement could have been violent without Gandhi. The communal forces could have dominated the political scene of the country and things could have been different now. Swadeshi and boycott movements wouldn't have more successful without Gandhi.
The women, peasants, and downtrodden, villagers and minorities participated in the large numbers in the freedom movement because of Gandhi. The freedom movement was more organised and peaceful because of Gandhi.